RAM HD Tradesman (ST, SXT in Canada) comfy enough?

You might consider looking for a low mileage 13 or 14 with some amenities.

I really like my 12 Laramie Longhorn. Great power handling and comfort.

I found that sitting on a tradesman seat was similar to sitting on an apple crate. Get a Big Horn(or what ever they call it up there) at least! Chris

I have the vinyl seats in my tradesman. I get a lot of comments on how nice my LEATHER seats are. Fits my butt nicely, no problems even after several hundred mile trips. Of course being vinyl, they get hot/cold, but such is life. It has no lumber adjustment.

Steering wheel does have tilt, and comes with the cruise and HUD buttons on it.

I do not regret NOT spending thousands more for "luxuries". It can lock/unlock my own door, even without a button. Eventually I have to open the door to get in, how hard is it to use the key to unlock it???? Power windows would be nice, but only when someone walks up to the passenger side wanting to talk to me. The rest of the time...I can roll it down if I want to hang my left arm out.

Why spent thousands more to buy someone else's used truck???? Buy NEW, with less options, for less than a "optioned" truck that is 2-3 years old with 30-50,000 miles on it.

Boxer Lovers wrote:
You might consider looking for a low mileage 13 or 14 with some amenities.

I really like my 12 Laramie Longhorn. Great power handling and comfort.

I DID look.

2-3 years old, 30-50,000 miles. All kinda bells & whistles. Thousands of dollars more for that used trade-in that some leasee has already abused.

Those "options" were not worth it to me. Why spend thousands more for a used truck, when a less optioned truck was less money....NEW.

Tradesman for me ! I will not spend half a years take home for upgrades !
Remember , you ain't gonna marry it , it is still just transportation .

I have the tradesman with power and chrome package. The one thing it doesn't have you mentioned is the lumbar support. But to me the seats are plenty comfortable. I came from leather in my last 3 trucks to cloth in this one, and other than easier to clean I don't miss the leather. Seats are comfortable temp wise year around. I do plan on nice seat covers in the near future. And as far as amenities go it has everything I need. Bluetooth, remote keyless entry, full power, back up cam and park sensors, sat radio, media player, cruise, steering wheel controls, factory bed liner, all weather mats, etc. And just for comparison, when I bought mine the next step up SLT was $4000 more and really only extras were alloy wheels, power driver seat, fog lights, and 8in screen radio upgrade that had Navigation. Wasn't worth it to me as I never use the nav and liked the wheel/tire package on mine better. That's obviously personal preference though. And of course the Laramie and up was substantially more! And like you stated, the used ones I looked at one to three years older were right at and even more in some cases than I paid for my brand new unmolested and fully warrantied truck that I have the pleasure of knowing where it's been and what it's done and been maintained since day one! That's worth quite a bit to me with these new and quite complex diesel trucks.

Absolutely zero regrets here!

I looked at a few Tradesmen, but after having some "luxuries" in a recent vehicle, I decided I did not want to go without some of those items.

Now, had I gone from '03 Explorer directly to a Tradesmen, I wouldn't know what I was missing.

My point is that if you don't have them now, you likely won't miss them.

But, there are a few things I think are essential - back-up camera, power windows & locks, and remote start. Bluetooth is nice, but certainly not essential. Your essentials may be different though.

brulaz wrote:
Looking to get a 4x4 truck this Spring and will probably upgrade to a new HD at the same time, perhaps even diesel.

We don't need, and can't afford, anything fancy, so would like to look at a 2500/3500 RAM ST (Tradesman in the States) with the SXT option (cloth seats, rugs, remote keyless entry), but all they have on the local lot are RAM Laramies and such. Way out of our price range.

So before traveling far to see one, thought I'd first ask here how people like them for long drives. A few questions in particular:
- are they as quiet as the next higher grade, the SLT?
- does the manual driver seat have a lumbar adjust?
- does the steering wheel adjust up/down?
- any regrets not spending the extra $$ on an SLT?

We are looking at other brands too, but just wanted to concentrate on the RAM for now.

Many thanks for any comments.

I have a well optioned Tradesman and I love it. The truck is my daily driver and we have gravitated towards using it on longer family trips as well because with the Softopper I bought it carries a lot of cargo easily (important - wife, three daughters and dog).

I think the sound insulation is the same. It's a quiet cruiser although not as quiet as the other diesels. There is no lumbar adjustment on the drivers seat but I do think the seats are very comfortable. The steering wheel tilts up/down but does not telescope in/out.

I have no regrets I'd consider material at this trim level. The biggest thing I gave up was leather which is nice with kids, but my plan there is to use the cloth seats till they start to wear and then have good aftermarket leather installed for $1-2k. The interior overall is great as far as I'm concerned, with the two caveats being that the door arm rests are pretty hard and I wish the steering wheel telescoped. The exterior is awesome and very clean - I actually think it looks quite a bit nicer than the higher trim levels where you get the gaudy grill and tacked on fenders. I like a cleaner look to the point that I debadged all the stuff on the front doors and just left the C on each fender - I don't need somebody in an airliner to be able to read what kind of truck I'm driving. The stock tires suck (all trim levels) and I don't like the chrome wheels, so when the stock shoes wear out I'll swap in some nice aftermarket 18" wheels.

My truck has the Cummins, 4wd, chrome/popular equipment, factory bedliner, 5.0 radio, auto, IBC, anti-spin rear diff, cold weather, protection group and a few other options I'm not remembering off-hand. Sticker was at $51k, I paid $39k. Not exactly cheap, but a good deal in today's truck pricing environment. She tows our fifth wheel like an animal.

I bought a pretty well equipped new 2015 Ram Tradesman a few weeks ago. So far I love it. It has chrome package, 4X4, preferred equipment (carpet, remote, larger tires, etc), parksense, parkview, trailer brake controller and other nice items. It has the Uconnect 5.0 which has voice control over phone and radio/media functions. The only thing it doesn't have that wife wanted was navigation.

Gettting an SLT would have added about $5K to $6k since there were no 2015s and I would have had to go with a 2016. The new truck iis much quieter and more comfortable riding than our 2008 Ram 2500 that we traded. I find the seats comfortable. I thought about the 6.4 Hemi, but decided I loved the towing power of the CTD in our 2008 so I again went with the Cummins.

At 62 I can live without a lot of the gadgets that did not even exist until a few years ago to save over $5K. Our 2008 was a Texas Edition, equivalent to the current Big Horn, and this new 2015 truck is better equipped overall. Only thing it lacks that the 2008 had was a sliding rear window (which I didn't use anyway). We all use our trucks differently, so only you can know what works for you. Good luck. Keith

Thanks for all the comments so far.

The lack of lumbar adjust may be be an issue to me 'cause of the bad back (herniated disk). But I guess I'll just have to find one and sit in it for a while to find out for sure.

Other than that, it looks like the ST/Tradesman has all the options we want. Would hate to spend the several extra thousands for an SLT just to have a more comfortable seat, but for long range driving, it's essential.